The invention pertains to a shot simulator using laser light and particularly to a simulator for simulating guided missiles which are controlled towards a target by continuously tracking the target with a sight of a weapon during the travelling time of the missile.
It is wellknown in the art to use laser radiation transmitters coupled to a weapon for simulating actual shooting and thereby practising the shooting operation of the weapon and the skill of the aimsman without the need of actually firing ammunition from the weapon. When actuating the trigger of the weapon the laser transmitter will emit a narrow beam of laser radiation substantially along the line of sight, preferably a bundle or succession of differently coded radiation beams having different small angular deviations from the line of sight. By receiving the laser radiation at the target position or the radiation reflected from the target and analysing the code thereof the amount and direction of the angular deviation of the sight from the target at the moment of firing the weapon may be calculated and a hit indicating device may be controlled depending on whether or not this angular deviation corresponds to a correct aiming of the weapon. The known shot simulators of this kind, however, are only suitable for simulating the shooting with projectiles or unguided ballistic missiles where the firing accuracy depends only on the correct target tracking and aiming of the weapon at the moment of firing the weapon.
On the other hand there have been known weapons using guided missiles which after firing are controlled towards a target by keeping the line of sight of the weapon aimed towards the normally moving target during the total travelling time of the missile. An example for weapons of this type are the so-called beam rider missiles which are adapted to automatically follow a guiding laser beam emitted by a laser transmitter coupled to the sight of the weapon. With weapons of this type the accuracy of the shot does not entirely depend on the correct aiming of the weapon at the moment of firing, but mainly on the accuracy with which the tracking point of the sight is kept coincident with the target during the travelling time of the missile. Short momentary deviations of the line of sight from the target are of course unavoidable. These deviations are tolerable if they are small and short enough, but the more frequent these deviations occur, the greater they are, the longer they last and the closer they are to the end of the travelling time, the greater will be the likelihood that the missile will not reach the target.
A shot simulator for simulating such guided missiles has been known from German Pat. No. 2 149 701. It uses a laser transmitter which emits a laser beam continuously over a period of time corresponding to the travelling time of the simulated missile, and it measures those time intervals during which the target actually receives the laser radiation and compares the sum of these intervals with the aforementioned period of time. A hit or miss indicating device is controlled depending on whether the laser radiation has reached the target over a sufficient portion of time within the simulated missile travelling time. The hit indication is further controlled in a statistical manner by using a random generator in order to similate the fact that the tracking deviations occurring during the tracking time will have different influence on the hit accuracy depending on their magnitude, direction and the time at which they occur.
Although this prior art shot simulator until now has been the best approach to a realistic simulation of sight guided missiles, it does nevertheless not provide a completely realistic simulation of such shooting. For example it only enables to distinguish between a hit and a miss-hit, but it does not enable to determine quantitatively how close to a hit a miss-hit has been. Moreover with the prior art device it is not possible to take account of the fact that certain types of deviations, for example those downwardly directed, have a greater likelihood of causing a miss-hit than others, and also the quantitative relation between the magnitude and duration of tracking deviations and the inertia of the particular missile which is to be simulated cannot be taken account of.